I can finally post a thread here.
I'll have owned this truck for 8 years in September.

When I bought it, it needed a clutch and a serious oil leak fixed. Did that right away.
Here's after my first time out.


Within a few months, I found some tires on a local wheelers board, stayed with the 33s. Bought an entire truck at a swap meet so I could have the bumper and roll bar. Winch went in right away. Warn 8k.



Years went by without me doing anything to it but rear brakes and a u-joint or two. I've wheeled it plenty, it's been my reliable truck as well,carried more than its fair share of loads for me, from moving to dirt to lumber to whatever.





Then I decided to bob it, the driver's rear had taken a beating, but only way to hold the tail light from falling off was to duct tape it on. Found a donor ass end and slapped it on.



Last week, ordered me a set of 4.88s, Aussie lockers front and rear, a high steer kit, and a front axle rebuild kit. That'll all go on next week.

Till then, I'm stuck playing with the paint, kinda trying to figure out just what to do with it.

 

Good looking rig man!

 

Nice rig, are you gonna stick with the 33's?

 

Welcome to YT! Nice look'n 85'. post pics of your progress...

 

Thanks.
I am going to stay with the 33s. I've been able to do most of the trails at the local ORV parks without using too many bypasses all these years with open diffs. I figure I'll lock it and with a little bit of gearing, really be capable of tackling the harder trails. I'm not looking for a rock crawler so much.

I like its height, 3inch lift, I use it 95% of the time as just my truck and not my wheeler. It could be a daily driver, but I hate putting unnecessary miles on it. I've only put just over 11k miles on it in the 8 years I've driven it. 160 on the clock.

Next year I'll put longer shocks and springs aiming for some droop.

Will post more after it comes together next week.

 

Last of the goodies showed up, I'll drop it off today. hehehe
Paint's all but done, I need to black out the chrome on the grill. Let the truck be a few colors, I don't mind, actually dig it.
Have a sweet jdm (lol) HILUX badge to cover the one on the grill.

 

Nice. I dig the paint ya got goin on

 

howdy,can you put 33s on a stock runner without a lift kit?i just got this one dont know much about it.

 

Such an awesome truck! Very nice work! Wish I could find one...

 

Paint's kind of an experiment. I wasn't sure how it would turn out, but wanted to play witht the idea of using Eddie Van Halen's guitar as inspiration for cammo. lol I think I'll leave it like that, I stenciled "HILUX" in light green on the tailgate which is black.

For some reason, the color of the tan varied on the hood, kinda like Partridge Family meets a futuristic (tron) redneck.

 

very sick!

 

It's been a good truck, it's worth the time and money going into it right now.

 

Looks like a fun rig. How much did you Bob the box? I'm thinking of doing the same thing but I have a fair amount of rust. I might just do a flatbed.

 

I took an even foot off of it. I still use it for a truck around town, so the box is necessary to me.

 

I went with the 4.88s, and think I am happy I did. At least for on the road. It's never gonna be a race car, but the speedo is perfectly on the money now, had my wife pace me at several speeds. I was able to use 5th all I wanted on teh highway, rather than 4th or even 3rd on some of the hills.
I chose to to Aussies, front and rear. Figure'd screw it, if it's all coming apart, then I might as well have one put in the front too. I'm pretty stoked for the difference it's gonna make after all these years open.
Here are the only visible scars. FRIGGIN AMAZED at how much the steering seems like butter rather than a fight to turn the steering wheel!

 

sweet truck where you from in wa?

 

Burien/West Seattle.

 

I was looking at the first pics I thought wow that looks like Washington and then I saw Mt. Rainier.

 

Great truck! I'm actually looking into getting one of these as my next rig. Saves the time of doing the axle swap.

 

Im putting those stock stripes on my toyota tonight.